Kerry predicts GOP will cave to oil industry on Law of the Sea Treaty

The Senate champion of the United Nations's maritime convention declared himself unfazed Monday by reports that opponents have garnered enough Republican opponents to kill the Law of the Sea Treaty if it ever comes up for a vote on the floor.

The conservative Heritage Foundation, which is leading the fight against the treaty on the grounds that it would violate U.S. sovereignty, declared victory after 34 Republicans vowed to oppose it, depriving Democrats of the two-thirds majority needed to pass a treaty.

But Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry (D-Mass.) vowed to continue pushing the treaty and hold a vote after the November election, predicting that Republicans would cave to industry groups and the Navy, who back treaty provisions.

"Senator Kerry has been here long enough to know that vote counts and letters are just a snapshot of where our politics are in this instant, and it's not news to anyone that right now we're in the middle of a white hot political campaign season where ideology is running in overdrive,” Kerry spokeswoman Jodi Seth said in a statement. “That's why Senator Kerry made it clear there wouldn't be a vote before the election and until everyone's had the chance to evaluate the treaty on the facts and the merits away from the politics of the moment.”

She went on to predict that the broad coalition lined up in favor of ratification will win out in the end over what treaty advocates say are misinformed concerns. The U.S. Navy says it needs the treaty to effectively keep the peace in places such as the South China Sea where competing sovereignty claims risk igniting a war, and the oil-and-gas industry says it can't risk drilling in the potentially lucrative outer continental shelf if the United States doesn't sign on to the treaty and guarantee its claims.

“No letter or whip count changes the fact that rock-ribbed Republican businesses and the military and every living Republican Secretary of State say that this needs to happen, and that's why it's a matter of 'when' not 'if' for the Law of the Sea,” she said. “The Chamber of Commerce, and the oil and gas and telecommunications industries are some of the most effective in this town because they stick to their guns and they've been unequivocal about the need to get this done. They'll keep at it, and we will continue the work of answering questions and building the public record.”

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